Yoruba Muslims: Religious Encounter and Social Change up to 1960 3.1 Introduction
By the 1950s, almost all Yorubaland had encountered Islam, Christianity, colonial rule and Western culture. The encounter led to a significant change in social relations, religious identity, economic and political development in several communities. How the Yoruba interacted with the two foreign religions and colonialization, and the conditions under which their interaction took place, created new crises and opportunities, as well as diversity among them. On the one hand, this chapter explores this encounter between the Yoruba and Islam, and on the other hand between Yoruba Muslims, Christianity and colonial rule. The first aim of the chapter is to show the social context and experience of Yoruba Muslims up to the period when the MSSN was established, and how this experience shaped the visions set out for the Society. This is in line with the main argument of the chapter that the history of MSSN is linked to the encounter of Yoruba Muslims with Christianity and the social change that was facilitated by colonization.
Secondly, this chapter aims to illustrate the process of religious change of the Yoruba Muslims and its connection to the history of MSSN.
The first section focuses on the history of the Yoruba, showing the various aspects of their culture, religion, economic and political organisations. Although I refer to the past in this section, I discussed many aspects of Yoruba history in the present tense to show their continuity in contemporary times. The second section is on the history of Islam among the Yoruba. This section points attention to the origin of the religion, the factors that facilitated its development and how it was practised and organised. In the third section, I focused on the process of Christianization of the Yoruba and why the educational activity of Christian missions challenged the Yoruba Muslims. This section also demonstrates the process of the imposition of colonial rule, which facilitated modern economic and political developments in Yorubaland, and why the broader colonial system benefited the cause of the Christian missions. The fourth section describes the response of Yoruba Muslims to the social transformation caused by Christianization and colonization and how this response impacted their new ways of life and identities as Muslims. In the fifth section, I show the experiences of Yoruba Muslim students and what their experiences tell us about the Yoruba Muslim society up to the end of colonial
rule. I conclude the chapter by reflecting on the process of religious change among Yoruba Muslims up to the end of colonial rule.
3.2 Yoruba: people, culture and society
The geographical location of the Yorubas has changed since the end of the twentieth century.
However, the majority of the Yoruba have remained in their former location which is in the present-day southwest region of Nigeria made up of six states: Ekiti, Lagos, Ogun, Ondo, Osun and Oyo. Other Yoruba groups in Kwara and Kogi States are part of the North-Central region of Nigeria. It is difficult to give an accurate population of the Yoruba due to errors and politics that have been associated with the figure since the colonial period.279 But in 2017, the population of Nigeria was estimated to be 182 million. The Yoruba are estimated to be twenty-one per cent of this figure which is second to the Hausa and Fulani’s twenty-nine per cent.280 In the diaspora, Yoruba communities are in several countries across the world, notably the Republic of Benin, Togo, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Cuba and Brazil.
This study is based on those in southwest Nigeria.
The ethnogenesis of the Yoruba has been a subject of academic and theological debates. A popular Yoruba oral tradition claimed that the universe was created at Ile-Ife (now a city in Osun State) after Oduduwa descended from heaven.281 Oduduwa is thus held as the mythical hero of the Yoruba while Ile-Ife is regarded as their sacred home. Another tradition propounded by Samuel Johnson suggested that the Yoruba were from the Middle East in Upper-Egypt. He was of the view that the Yoruba were subjects of the Egyptian conqueror named Nimrod, who followed him to a battle in Arabia before migrating to Ile-Ife.282 Academic historians rejected this argument partly because it confirms the ‘Hamitic theory’ which colonialist historians such as C.G. Seligman used to reject African civilisation. The Hamitic theory suggests that African civilisation was not indigenous but benefited from the Middle East.283
279 Babatunde A. Ahonsi, “Deliberate Falsification and Census Data in Nigeria,” African Affairs 87, no. 349 (1988).
280 National Population Commission, “Nigeria's Population Now 182 Million: NPC,”,
http://population.gov.ng/nigerias-population-now-182-million-npc/ (accessed November 29, 2017).
281 Jacob K. Olupona, City of 201 Gods: Ilé-Ifè in Time, Space, and the Imagination (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011), 29–30; P. C. Lloyd, “Sacred Kingship and Government Among the Yoruba,” Africa:
Journal of the International African Institute 30, no. 3 (1960): 223.
282 Samuel Johnson, The History of the Yorubas: From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the British Protectorate, (Lagos: CMS Bookshop Nigeria, 1921), 6–7.
283 Robin Law, “The "Hamitic Hypothesis" in Indigenous West African Historical Thought,” History in Africa, no. 36 (2009).
An alternative theory was propounded by P. C. Lloyd who suggested that the Yoruba migrated from the savanna belt to the forest in different groups.284 Academic historians such as I. A.
Akinjogbin are also of the view that the Yoruba had settled in their location for a very long time before Oduduwa arrived.285 Several archaeological findings at Ile-Ife and other Yoruba towns from 1910 including those of Leo Frobenius, Frank Willet,286 Gérard Chouin and Adisa Ogunfolakan,287 gave some credit to this theory. While the Yoruba ethnogenesis remained controversial, what I consider noteworthy is that some of these theories indicate that there is a link, which remains unclear, between the Yoruba and the Muslim world before the large-scale adoption of Islam in Yorubaland. Later, I will demonstrate this with reference to the Ifá divination and the conversion stories of some Yorubas to Islam.
As a cultural group, the Yoruba are widely diverse. Before the twentieth century, there was little or no common consciousness which suggests that they were one ‘Yoruba’ people. The word ‘Yoruba’ was mostly used to refer to people of the old Oyo empire by their neighbours and traders which included the Hausa.288 By the second half of the eighteenth century, the old Oyo empire was the largest and most powerful in Yorubaland with an army based on cavalry.
Its capital was in the savannah of the Niger valley and it stretched over Nupe, Dahomey and southeast towards Benin Republic. Following its destruction in 1830, the capital shifted to the south where a new empire was founded at its present location.289 Besides the reference made to Oyo, the people refer to themselves in terms of the name of their towns and cities such as Ife, Oyo, Ijebu, Abeokuta, Ilorin, Osogbo, Ilesa, Eko, Ibadan and Ogbomoso.290 However, they speak different dialects which are mutually intelligible and categorised based on their towns.
It is in the writings of those who documented them such as Sultan Bello of Sokoto, European travellers and Christian missionaries that the word ‘Yoruba’ was found and began to be used as an identity marker for these linguistic groups.291 Today, it is plausible to refer to them as a
284 Lloyd, “Sacred Kingship and Government among the Yoruba”: 222.
285 I. A. Akinjogbin, The Cradle of a Race: Ife from the Beginning to 1980 (Port Harcourt: Sunray Publications, 1992).
286 Frank Willet, “Ife and Its Archaeology,” The Journal of African History 1, no. 2 (1960).
287 Chouin, L. Gérard and Ogunfolakan, B. Adisa, “Ife-Sungbo Archeological Project: Preliminary Report on Excavations at Ita Yemoo, Ile-Ife Osun State and on Rapid Assessment of Earthwork Sites at Eredo and Ilara Epe, Lagos State,” (2015).
288 Robin Law, ed., Contemporary Source Material for the History of the Oyo Empire, 1627-1824 (Toronto:
York/UNESCO Nigerian Hinterland Project York Univ., 2001), 1; Johnson, The History of the Yorubas, 6.
289 Robin Law, The Oyo Empire, C.1600-C.1836: A West African Imperialism in the Era of the Atlantic Slave Trade, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977).
290 Lloyd, “Sacred Kingship and Government among the Yoruba”: 223.
291 Peel, Christianity, Islam and Oriṣa-religion, 150; Samuel Johnson, The History of the Yorubas: From Earliest Times to the Beginning of the British Protectorate, (Lagos: CMS Bookshop Nigeria, 1921), 6.
linguistic group rather than a ‘Yoruba nation’ as economic and political reasons within the larger Nigerian context have been used to create a sense of unity among them.
The traditional socio-political organisations of the Yoruba are varied. In his study of their political systems, N. A. Fadipe identified four monarchical models based on how governments and royal lineages are organised. This includes the Oyo, Ife, Ijebu-Ode and Egba models.292 The Ibadan and Lagos models are different from these four.293 In these monarchical structures, there are kingdoms such as Ife, Oyo and Owo which are headed by sacred kings regarded as ekeji Òrìṣà (second to the gods). They also performed secular functions,294 usually with the assistance of titled chiefs and, to an extent, by honorary chiefs. The family (ẹbi) is the smallest unit of social organisation in Yorubaland. Polygamy is socially acceptable in this family unit, but monogamy is also widespread. It is common for members of the families to live together in the same compound called agbo-ile (a flock of houses which adjoin each other with a wall between adjacent apartments).295 The compound is both a residential and political organisation named after the head male called baale, who is respected by the juniors. In most cases, members of the agbo-ile, except women who are married into it as wives, are usually related to the father.296 The agbo-ile is central to the development of urbanization of the Yoruba in that several of it make up the ìlú (city-state or town). But there are also farm villages called aba or abule which are temporary settlements for farmers.297
The traditional Yoruba economy is also diverse.298 Up to the 1960s, farming was the major occupation of the people. In this period, several farmers changed from subsistence to commercial production by the mid-nineteenth century and later benefited from the crash crop export of goods like cocoa, rubber and palm oil in the colonial period.299 Many other people engaged in trade, wood carving, fishing, metalworking, hunting, dressmaking, dyeing and
292 N. A. Fadipẹ, The Sociology of the Yoruba, (Ibadan: Ibadan University Press, 1970), 199.
293 Lloyd, “Sacred Kingship and Government among the Yoruba”: 222; Fadipẹ, The Sociology of the Yoruba, 199.
294 Fadipẹ, The Sociology of the Yoruba, 206.
295 Ibid., 97.
296 Ibid., 107.
297 J. S. Eades, The Yoruba Today (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980), 38.
298 See Toyin Falola, The Political Economy of a Pre-Colonial African State: Ibadan, 1830 - 1900 (Ile-Ife:
Univ. of Ife Press, 1984); Adeoti, Oladele Ezekiel and Ojo, Oluranti Edward, “The Dynamics of Pre-Colonial West African Economy: The Yoruba Experience,” Nigerian Journal of Economic History 11, no. 12 (2014).
299 O. G. Muojama, The Nigerian Cocoa Industry and the International Economy in the 1930s: A World-Systems Approach (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2018), 22–23; Julian Clarke,
“Households and the Political Economy of Small-Scale Cash Crop Production in South-Western Nigeria,”
Africa 51, no. 04 (1981): 818–20.
basket weaving. Even though there are modern economic activities today, these occupations continue to be the mainstay of many Yorubas. The economy in the precolonial period also developed a financial institution that made money available for commercial transactions. A. G.
Adebayo has argued that the impact of the monetization of the economy in precolonial Yoruba facilitated the development of social classes and aided the formation and accumulation of capital.300 A major example was the city of Ibadan where powerful war-chiefs like Basorun Oluyole (d. 1847), Balogun Ibikunle (d. 1864) and Aarẹ Momodu Latoosa (d. 1885) emerged following the collapse of the former Oyo empire in the nineteenth century. Apart from leading wars, these warriors also accumulated wealth through agriculture and trade, which they needed in order to support their families and maintain soldiers and slaves.301
In their social lives, the Yoruba usually form organisations or associations called ẹgbẹ. Ẹgbẹ may also be used to mean union, party, club or society. Their emergence is often considered to be from Yoruba compounds, ethnic and kinship group.302 While this is true in some cases, the trajectory of several other ẹgbẹ did not follow this trend. In a number of cases, associations are also formed to promote and protect common interests in various fields such as trade, politics, religion and recreation. A major example is the age-grades, Regberegbe, in Ijebu-Ode. Since the nineteenth century, the Regberegbe have developed into highly organised social groups within the political structure of Ijebu-Ode and have played a major role in community development.303 Although MSSN was inspired by the prevailing condition of Muslim students in the 1950s, its formation is a continuity of this Yoruba associational life.
Another common feature in the social relation of the Yoruba are the attributes which they used to describe their rival groups. Olufunke Adeboye in her study on intra-ethnic segregation between the Ijebu and Ibadan showed that such attributes may be considered stereotypes and taunts that developed in the nineteenth century crises in Yorubaland.304 Beyond stereotypes, these attributes are important because they illustrate the nature of diversity among them and
300 A. G. Adebayo, “Money, Credit, and Banking in Precolonial Africa: The Yoruba Experience,” Anthropos, Bd 89. 4, no. 6 (1994): 379.
301 Bolanle Awe, “Militarism and Economic Development in Nineteenth Century Yoruba Country: The Ibadan Example,” Journal of African History XIV, I (1973): 65–70.
302 Fadipẹ, The Sociology of the Yoruba, 243; Abimbola O. Adesoji, “Progressive Unions and the Competition for Community Development in Nigeria: A Study of Ifon, Ilobu and Erin Progressive Unions, 1940-1970,”
African Study Monographs 29, no. 2 (2008): 52.
303 Margaret O. Areo, “Regbe-Regbe: Multidimensional Impact of Cloth and Colour in Ojude-Ode Oba Festival,” International Journal of Humanities and Social Science 5, no. 5 (2016): 55–9.
304 Olufunke Adeboye, “Intra-Ethnic Segregation in Colonial Ibadan: The Case of Ijebu Settlers,” in Security, Crime and Segregation in West African Cities since the 19th Century, eds. Laurent Fourchard and Isaac Olawale Albert, 303–20 (Ibadan: Karthala et IFRA, 2003), 303–20.
how they understood themselves. They also point to the various aspects of their social encounter. Johnson gives a general feature of these attributes,
“dogged perseverance and determination characterise the Ijebus, love of ease and a quickness to adapt new ideas the Egbas, the Ijesas and Ekitis are possessed of a marvellous amount of physical strength, remarkable docility and simplicity of manners, and love of home… the Ibarapas are laborious farmers, the Ibolos are rather docile and weak in comparison with others, but the Epos are hardy, brave, and rather turbulent whilst the Oyos of the Metropolitan province are remarkably shrewd, intelligent, very diplomatic, cautious almost to timidity, provokingly conservative, and withal very masterful.”305
Despite these stereotypes, values such as chastity for women, hospitality, paying homage and respecting senior persons and those in authority are generally upheld. The young greet the elderly person by prostration (for male), kneeling (for female) or sitting and reclining on the left elbow (for female).306 There is also a rich oral literature among the Yoruba which includes proverb (òwe), folktales (alo̩), poems (ewi), panegyric (oriki) and oral prose (itan aroso̩) used to teach morals, praise, honour, entertain and ensure social control in the society.307 This may be accompanied by dance and musical instruments during ritual festivals and life-cycle ceremonies.308
As in many African societies, religion permeates the social, economic and political institutions of the Yoruba. Peel’s study shows that the concept of “religion” is unknown to the practitioners in the past.309 Rather, they talked about aṣa (custom/fashion) or aṣa ibile (country fashion).
The term “country fashion”, according to Peel, is employed to mean a “shifting and unbounded body of customary practices rather than a definite and integrated ‘religion’.”310 The customary practices encompass “religion” and other phenomena like manner of greeting, dress, food, burial ceremonies, marriage and system of governance.
305 Johnson, The History of the Yorubas, 102; Olufunke Adeboye, “Intra-Ethnic Segregation in Colonial Ibadan” in Security, Crime and Segregation in West African Cities since the 19th Century, 310–11.
306 Johnson, The History of the Yorubas, 109.
307 See Adesoye Omolasoye, “Yoruba Oral Literature as a Panacea for Unemployment in Nigeria,” Knowledge Review 25, no. 1 (2012); Oludáre Ǫlájubù, “The Use of Yoruba Folktales as a Means of Moral Education,”
Fabula 19, Jahresband (1978); David Welch, “Ritual Intonation of Yoruba Praise-Poetry (Oríkì),” Yearbook of the International Folk Music Council 5 (1973); Karin Barber, I Could Speak Until Tomorrow: Oriki, Women and the Past in a Yoruba Town, (Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. Press, 1991).
308 Fasan, “Women and Child-Naming Song Poetry of Southeast Yorubaland,” Research in African Literatures 46, no. 1 (2015): 107.
309 Peel, Religious Encounter and the Making of the Yoruba., 88-89.
310 Ibid., 90.
A fundamental belief in the “religion” of the people is the existence of a supernatural Supreme Being called Olódùmarè whom they believe can be reached through spirits and deities referred to as Òrìṣà (divinities). Among these deities are Ògún (god of iron), Ṣàngó (god of lightning and thunder), Ọṣun (goddess of the river), Èṣù (trickster and messenger) and Egúngún (lit.
“masquerade,” representing the spirit of the dead).311 Bolaji Idowu is of the view that these divinities are regarded as the ministers of Olódùmarè in a theocratic government of the universe.312 Because the Yoruba considered these divinities to be relevant in their relationship with Olódùmarè, these divinities are believed to play important roles in what happens to individuals and the community including security, prosperity and outbreak of epidemics.
Rituals and festivals are also associated with these divinities.313 The rituals and festivals could be performed on the advice of Ifá when the need arises, for example in times of misfortune or insecurity. Broadly speaking, Ifá is at the centre of religious practice of the Yoruba. It is regarded as a corpus of coded messages in poems (ẹsẹ) about the past which are organised under some figures called odu.314 Omotade Adegbindin argues that Ifá is also a collection of myths, history, proverbs and one of the expressions of the Yoruba thought system.315 It may be consulted by individuals or the community before undertaking any major action and could explain the procedure that is needed to accomplish it.316 This is necessary to seek the favour of deities and spirits which are believed to reside in different spaces such as the markets, or environmental and natural resources like the earth, trees, rivers and thunderstorms. Deities and spirits are also believed to reside in some individuals such as kings, twins, albinos, and people with hunchbacks.317 In the nineteenth century, Peel argues that Christian missionaries associate this “religious” custom with terms like “heathenism” and “idolatry” which suggest a cult of local idols. These terms were employed to imply that the custom was lower in rank to Christianity which was seen as an ‘ideal religion.’318 Even though it is debateable, many studies
311 Ibid., 89–107; John A. I. Bewaji, “Olodumare: God in Yoruba Belief and the Theistic Problem of Evil,”
African Studies Quarterly 2, no. 1 (1998): 7–12.
312 Bolaji E. Idowu, African Traditional Religion: A Definition (London: SCM Press Ltd., 1973), 62.
313 Bolaji E. Idowu, Olodumare: God in Yoruba Belief (London: Longmans, 1962), 108–9.
314 Peel, Christianity, Islam and Oriṣa-religion, 36.
315 Omotade Adegbindin, Ifá in Yorùbá Thought System, (Durham, North Carolina: Carolina Academic Press, 2014), 18–20.
316 Peter Morton-Williams, William Bascom and E. M. McClelland, “Two Studies of Ifa Divination,” Africa 36, no. 04 (1966): 406; Peel, Religious Encounter and the Making of the Yoruba, 98–99.
317 Ade Dọ̀pamu, “The Yorùbá Religious System,” Africa Update 4, no. 3 (1999). Andrew Apter, “Notes on Orisha Cults in the Ekiti Yoruba Highlands. A Tribute to Pierre Verger,” Cahiers d'Études africaines 35,
317 Ade Dọ̀pamu, “The Yorùbá Religious System,” Africa Update 4, no. 3 (1999). Andrew Apter, “Notes on Orisha Cults in the Ekiti Yoruba Highlands. A Tribute to Pierre Verger,” Cahiers d'Études africaines 35,